Signs of a dry guitar…information from Martin, Taylor, Gibson, Zager and every guitar manufacturer in the world.

Place your guitar standing up on a wall facing you. Take 5 soaking wet washcloths, wring them out, drop them into the sound hole and plug the sound hole with your humidifier. If you don’t have a humidifier cover the sound hole with cellophane wrap as it’s important to seal the moisture in. Leave your guitar standing up and you should be good as new in 72 hours with no buzzing. If not, repeat adding more water. This video will guide you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2F-IX1JlnA
 
When woods get dry the face lowers 1 millimeter which throws off the geometry of the entire guitar causing buzzing, poor sound and multiple issues. This is true for all quality solid wood guitars made by all manufacturers but happens more frequently on higher level instruments with thinner hand scalloped bracing which give you that deeper sound and easier playability. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CXwdWZGfdM
 
This method of sealing moisture inside the body raising humidity to 90% puts the face back into its original position. The video below explains the steps Mr. Zager uses in the shop on buzzing strings, but hydrating the woods (dropping 5 wet towels in the body) is now what he does first before any adjustment because in 99% of cases it’s all that’s required.
 
This technique Mr Zager’s grandfather created has been used over 75 years now by millions of players on all brands of guitars with about a 100% success rate. Once the process is complete be sure to maintain humidity over 60% (we keep our shop at 65%) using a humidifier and you will have no other problems. https://zagerguitar.com/guitars/humidification-system/
 
If you question how well this system works, read the comments of the hundreds of thousands of players who have used it in this video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UIvs2q3u6w
 
If you continue to have issues watch this video where Mr. Zager explains in more detail the process of rehydrating and if need be replacing the saddle and dialing in string height back to it’s original position so you have no buzzing https://youtu.be/ExPNMfkLFqw

This is a serious sign of dry woods. When a guitars woods get dry, they contract. When this happens metal parts become loose. A good guitar vibrates a lot as vibration puts out big sound, but it also causes those metal parts to become even looser.
 
This is an easy fix, and we have two videos that will guide you, but it’s imperative to check your humidity levels and make sure you maintain minimally 55% humidity as dry woods will begin to warp and they will eventually crack. This video will show you how to tighten the amplifier jack if it’s only slightly loose: https://youtu.be/4cnbN8IXA_I .
 
This video will show you how to tighten the amplifier jack if it’s really loose spinning and dangling: https://youtu.be/nJlp9YBiz6U

This happens when the woods of the neck get so dry that they shrink and contract actually warping the neck. All Zager guitars have truss rods so we have fewer issues with this as the truss can be turned to straighten the neck back into a position that alleviates any string buzzing or rattling. We have videos on how to turn the truss on our help page at http://zager.com/help

This type of damage is only caused by dryness as when woods get dry they shrink causing metal parts like frets to pop out of position. It’s rare though that one or even several high or sprung frets will cause buzzing. 9 times out of 10 what actually happened is the face lowered 1 millimeter which is extremely common. Also be sure to check your overall string height. String height should be 3/16 measuring from the 12th fret space to the top of the big E string. If you’re below this you will have issues. Also know the face will move due to dryness well before any frets will. Mr. Zager talks about this in this video: https://youtu.be/jsRXBnl1RdY To put the face back into original position follow the 72 hour Zager hydration method in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2F-IX1Jln To adjust string height follow Mr. Zager’s videos on setting string height at http://Zager.com/help

A hump on the fretboard is only caused by dry woods shrinking in opposting directions and rates of the various pieces of wood comprising the neck, heel, and body joints. As long as the hump isn’t too high these can be repaired by filing the frets but should only be done by a qualified luthier. If you have buzzing strings this is rarely caused by a hump. 99% of buzzing is caused by the face lowering due to dryness which is easy to fix using the Zager hydration method: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2F-IX1Jln

This is a major sign of dryness. When your woods get dry the neck contracts and shrinks leaving the metal frets sticking out. On these guitars Mr. Zager takes a small piece of fine grit sand paper and folds it over a few times making it thicker and runs it lightly down the side of the neck going over those protruding frets. This smooths them out so they’re no longer hurting your fingers.

Place your guitar standing up on a wall facing you. Take 5 soaking wet washcloths, wring them out, drop them into the sound hole and plug the sound hole with your humidifier. If you don’t have a humidifier cover the sound hole with cellophane wrap as it’s important to seal the moisture in. Leave your guitar standing up and you should be good as new in 72 hours with no buzzing. If not, repeat adding more water. This video will guide you: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2F-IX1JlnA
 
When woods get dry the face lowers 1 millimeter which throws off the geometry of the entire guitar causing buzzing, poor sound and multiple issues. This is true for all quality solid wood guitars made by all manufacturers but happens more frequently on higher level instruments with thinner hand scalloped bracing which give you that deeper sound and easier playability. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7CXwdWZGfdM
 
This method of sealing moisture inside the body raising humidity to 90% puts the face back into its original position. The video below explains the steps Mr. Zager uses in the shop on buzzing strings, but hydrating the woods (dropping 5 wet towels in the body) is now what he does first before any adjustment because in 99% of cases it’s all that’s required.
 
This technique Mr Zager’s grandfather created has been used over 75 years now by millions of players on all brands of guitars with about a 100% success rate. Once the process is complete be sure to maintain humidity over 60% (we keep our shop at 65%) using a humidifier and you will have no other problems. https://zagerguitar.com/guitars/humidification-system/
 
If you question how well this system works, read the comments of the hundreds of thousands of players who have used it in this video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UIvs2q3u6w

This has to do with placement of the transducer under the saddle and is a very easy adjustment. When woods get dry they shift causing the saddle (the white piece on the bridge) to become misaligned with the transducer underneath. This will give certain strings more volume than others. Now your heavier strings will always carry more volume than the thinner strings so if you’re lacking volume on the thinner strings this would need to be adjusted using the dials on your electronics control box.
 
In adjusting the saddle over the transducer the first thing we do is make sure humidity levels are minimally 60%. If not humidify your guitar as shown in this video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2F-IX1JlnA as this alone can move things back into position and cause the saddle to go back into alignment with the transducer underneath.
 
If you’ve humidified your guitar and you’re still having an issue the second thing we do is tap down hard on the saddle to make sure the saddle is seated securely and tightly over the transducer underneath. It may sound a bit crude but in working on these guitars over 3 generations it’s sometimes the simple things that get the best results.
 
If you’re still not hearing any sound differences after tapping on the saddle at that point we recommend loosening the strings (about 25 on turns on your tuning gears) and make sure the saddle (white piece) is seated in proper position over the transducer underneath. If they’re out of alignment and not touching fully you may hear some sound loss. Mr. Zager goes over this in more detail on this video: https://youtu.be/CnbYhbtZTtE 
 
If you’re still having an issue most any shop can adjust this in a few minutes which is much less costly, time consuming, and risky than spending $200 to ship your guitar back and forth across the country.

It’s not uncommon to have a little lift with full string pressure, meaning you can slide a piece of paper under the edge of the bridge.  We’ve had guitars that were like this for 40 years and never caused any problems.
 
When the bridge cracks or separates from your guitar this means at some point the humidity levels got extremely dry. When the woods of the face get too dry it causes the woods to contract and the face will lower one millimeter, sometimes two millimeters, which break the seal between the face and the bridge.
 
No guitar company warrants this type of damage as it’s preventable, but if you have a broken bridge let us know and Mr. Zager will make you a brand-new bridge and we’ll ship it free of charge.
 
If your bridge is only lifting, the best remedy for this is filling the gap with Elmers wood glue (with full string pressure) then loosening the strings so the bridge drops down into the face. Remove any extra glue with a damp towel as Elmers is water soluble, and in 72 hours you should be good as new.
 
If you need to install a new bridge any shop can do this for a minimal fee, and this is much less expensive than spending $200 shipping your guitar back and forth across the country. It also minimizes down time and risk of more damage. Mr. Zager has a video that explains what happens in greater detail here: https://youtu.be/UIrH0agQl6k

Cracks on guitars are common, especially in dry climates, and caused by only one thing, dryness. Most shops recommend refinishing cracks, meaning they repair the crack, then apply new finish over the top.
 
If you talk with the best luthiers in the world though, most will tell you to glue a crack and nothing else. The reason shops recommend refinishing is it’s an expensive procedure. At $75 an hour you can easily spend $700+ refinishing a portion of a guitar.
 
The problem with refinishing is not only is it expensive, but you’re layering new finish over old finish and this ruins sound quality, sound quality that’s sometimes taken decades to achieve.   There’s a reason players like Willie Nelson have never refinished their guitars. https://www.texasmonthly.com/arts-entertainment/trigger/
 
On guitars with cracks  Mr. Zager simply runs a line of Elmers wood glue wherever the cracks are and wipes off the excess as it’s water soluble.   It makes your guitar strong as it was new, without ruining your sound quality, and without costing you a fortune.  If you maintain humidity going forward you will have no other issues.

If you discover a crack in your neck, you’re first dealing with a guitar that is dry, or at some point was dry, as well humidified guitars don’t crack. You’re also dealing with a guitar that possibly took a blow to the head. Many times guitars are tipped in their stands and put back without the owner ever knowing. Often it’s a combination of both. If you have a small crack you can glue those and be good as new with no issues going forward.
 
To repair a crack simply fill the crack with Elmers wood glue (with full string pressure so the crack is open) then remove string pressure so the crack closes. As Elmers is water soluble wipe off any excess with a damp towel. Let dry for 72 hours, tune it back up and you should be good as new. These repairs generally last forever.
 
If you have a broken neck these guitars are not repairable as you can never get the neck back in proper alignment which leads to buzzes, rattles, tuning issues, and eventually due to string pressure they give way and collapse again. Yes, many shops will say they can repair them, but we’ve never seen a repair that did not have issues and eventually collapsed again.
 
If you have a guitar with a broken neck contact us as Mr. Zager will sometimes build a new guitar for those unlucky customers for material cost only.

A truss rod becomes locked when the woods of the neck get so dry that it warps the neck to a point that the truss rod will no longer turn and move the neck back into proper position. Truss rods are generally hard to turn, but if you’re pushing hard and it’s not moving at all, do not continue pushing or you will break the mechanism.
 
At this point we recommend turning the guitar upside down and putting penetrating oil on the truss where you insert the truss key and letting that oil soak and run down the rod for 72 hours. Once it’s moving you should be okay but only 50% of locked truss rods are repaired using oil. The next step would be to take it to a luthier, we usually recommend Guitar Center.
 
If you break a truss rod there are shops who repair them, but the cost is significant due to the amount of work involved in replacing the entire neck and mechanism to the body. 20 hours of work even at $50 an hour is often more than the price of the entire guitar on our entry models, and even then they often never play the same. In these situations please contact us as Mr. Zager will often replace the guitar at material cost only which is significantly less than retail cost.

When woods get dry on a guitar they shrink and contract moving in opposing directions and when this happens the body will separate from the neck. The only thing recommended when this happens is using Elmers glue as it’s water soluble and filling any gaps. If it’s still playing and sounding well you should have no problems going forward.

This has to do with lack of humidity.  At some point your guitars woods got dry.  When woods get dry they shift and contract causing movement of the face which can shift the binding but most of these issues are purely cosmetic.  Sometimes humidification can help as adding water back into the woods will put them back into position. This video will guide you https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2F-IX1JlnA  Mr. Zager highly discourages painting or refinishing as you would be applying new finish making the soundboard thicker which will affect sound quality.  There’s a reason Willie Nelson doesn’t refinish his Martin that has many cosmetic defects on it.  It’s because he knows if he did he would lose the sound quality he’s gained by years of aging. https://guitar.com/features/interviews/story-of-willie-nelsons-trigger-most-famous-acoustic-guitar/

This is a serious sign of dryness. This happens when the woods of your guitar become so dry that you lose structural integrity which causes the neck to actually drop down into the sound hole. Sometimes if you catch these guitars in time and begin humidifying them raising humidity back to 60% the drop will stop and you can continue playing these guitars with no real issues. If you do not humidify it will only get worse to where the guitar becomes unplayable and you will soon have major cracks inside the body and around the neck. Repairs like this should only be attempted by a qualified luthier.

This comes from dry woods shifting in different directions which can cause the electronics door to rattle when strumming certain chords. Mr. Zager has a video about this here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKzrNXntYOA&t=3s

This happens when the woods on the bridge become so dry that the saddle slot (that holds the saddle) expands and soon with string pressure your saddle begins to lean. This is not ideal but there are many guitars that continue to play well after this and if you choose to leave it alone Mr. Zager advises to at least begin humidifying your guitar with a humidifier. If you’re experiencing a playability or sound issue you can either replace the bridge or saddle. We recommend having a custom saddle (white part) made specifically for your wider slot by a luthier who can see your guitar so they can measure the slot and make a saddle that fits your slot.

This is only caused by dryness. When woods get dry they shift and contract causing movement of the face. When the woods are moving under the pickguard they will cause the adhesives holding the pickguard down to release. In these situations we recommend removing the pickguard and installing a new one. You can get a new pick guard on our parts page at https://zagerguitar.com/accessories/#replacement-parts Removing and installing a new guard can be done at any shop for minimal expense or you can do it at home. Mr. Zager has a video on that at http://zager.com/help

This is only caused by dryness. When the woods get dry inside your guitar they shift and contract and will make the adhesives that hold your wireholder to the body of your guitar come undone. You can get new wire holders on our parts page at https://zagerguitar.com/accessories/#replacement-parts and Mr. Zager has a video on reattaching the wireholder at http://zager.com/help

All acoustic guitars from all brands should have a face and back that bow outwards like a balloon. Some brands have more of this, some less, but they should all bow out on the face and back. If your guitar has a flat face and or a flat back this means your woods are dry and need water and you will soon be experiencing other issues like buzzing strings and eventually cracks. This video will guide you on hydrating your guitar to get water back into the woods https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2F-IX1JlnA

When you hear creaking this means your woods are so dry that your bracing inside your guitar as separated from the body leaving parts of your guitar unbraced. When this happens you can push in on certain parts of the fack and face and you will experience creaking of the body. In this situation we highly advise watering your guitar as shown in hour hydration video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2F-IX1JlnA and Mr. Zager recommends gluing those braces that have come loose. Some players do this on their own with Elmers glue as it’s water soluble but at these levels it’s usually recommended to take your guitar to a qualified shop.

Finish cracks are only caused by dryness. Finish cracks are caused when your guitars woods get do dry that the woods on the face, sides or back contract and shrink causing the thin outer finish to crack. This is purely cosmetic but is a sign that your woods are dry and should be hydrated as shown on our hydration video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2F-IX1JlnA Refinishing your guitar is never recommended as not only is it expensive, but you’re layering new finish over old finish and this ruins sound quality.   There’s a reason players like Willie Nelson have never refinished their guitars. https://www.texasmonthly.com/arts-entertainment/trigger/

This is caused by humidity and or temperature changes. Depending on the temperature and humidity levels of where you’re storing your guitar the wood under the inlay can swell or contract causing part of the inlay to raise or lower. If your climate is changing there will be some movement but this is common and generally, nothing to be concerned about unless you’re having a playability or sound issue. Be sure to keep humidity above 50% at all times…we keep our shop at 65%.

Mr. Zager builds his guitars using only real solid wood bridges and real solid wood bridge pins for the absolute best sound quality. If your guitar is not properly hydrated the woods of the bridge will contract making the pin holes larger and the wooden pins themselves will contract meaning pins will not hold in position on the bridge. In these situations Mr. Zager recommends humidification and possibly new pins. If you need new pins those are covered under our lifetime warranty and we’ll send new ones free of charge.

Zager Guitars have a hand scalloped bracing system you only see in high level guitars which give them their incredible playability and sound. This type of bracing system is more sensitive to temperature and climate change, but it’s also why Zager guitars are rated in the top 5% in the world.  This video explains in greater detail https://youtu.be/7CXwdWZGfdM To combat this Mr. Zager uses only seasoned woods building his guitars, and on the 900 Series all woods are torrified. One of the few guitar companies who torrifies their woods is Bourgeois Guitars which range in price from $15,000-$20,000.

Zager’s hydration method has been used over 75 years by millions of players with about a 100% success rate.  If you didn’t get results it means you didn’t follow the method exactly, or you need more water.  If you watch this video it will guide you and you WILL get results. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2F-IX1JlnA If you continue to have issues watch this video where Mr. Zager explains in more detail the process of rehydrating and if need be replacing the saddle and dialing in string height back to it’s original position so you have no buzzing https://youtu.be/ExPNMfkLFqw

50% humidity is a decent number to maintain your guitar (we keep our shop at 65%+) but it will not move the woods back into their original position. To do this you need humidity levels at 85% +. This is only done by super hydrating your guitar using the hydration method as shown in this video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2F-IX1JlnA

This tells you immediately your issues are 100% water related. By simply repeating the process your guitar will continue to improve. If your guitar’s been dry for several months or several years, it may take 5-6 rounds of watering to build water content back into the woods. Remember that dry guitars most shops won’t even attempt to repair as it’s impossible to straighten warped woods using conventional methods. Our watering technique takes guitars shops call “non repairable” and puts them back to 100% playability and sound.

If your guitar’s been really dried it may need more than water, but in four generations building guitars over 100 years, we’ve found all these guitars need is what they lost, water. Guitar shops are notorious for telling uninformed players their guitars need massive amounts of work so they can bill you massive amounts of money. It’s unfortunate, but being in the guitar business so long we’ve seen it’s quite common. 95% of issues caused by dryness can be repaired with water. If you think your guitar needs more work we recommend at least 3 rounds of watering first . If you see ANY improvement this tells you immediately your problems are water related and all you need is more water.

Your luthier may be correct.  When you dry out the woods on a guitar they warp and twist causing movement, separation, and eventually cracks which are all structural.   With that said, by putting water back into the woods it will move the woods back into their original position which is why watering your guitar using the Zager technique works so well. Depending on how dry your guitar is it may require additional work from a shop but always start with hydration first, minimally 3 rounds of watering.

If your guitar’s experiencing any of the signs of dryness listed at the top of this page your guitar’s woods are dry.  These symptoms have been documented and verified by EVERY guitar manufacturer and builder in the world. 

This is because your guitar was on its back when you watered it. It can also be caused by water being introduced back into the woods of an extremely dry guitar. Your guitar must be standing up vertically when doing the process as the woods at the bottom are thicker. Generally we find as your woods settle after the hydration process and water dissipates most of these spots disappear.

This is caused by water being introduced back into the woods of an extremely dry guitar and is very common. This will dissipate in time as the water absorbs into the grains.

Mr. Zager sets action at 3/16 measuring from the 12th fret space to the top of the big E string. If your guitar has been dried out you will not be able to go this low without buzzing. By hydrating your guitar and raising the face back into its original position you will be able to turn the truss key clockwise to lower action to 3/16 at the 12th fret space. Mr. Zager shows how to set string height on our help page at http://Zager.com/help

When your guitar got dry the woods on the neck contracted and shrank leaving the metal frets sticking out like barbs. On guitars like this Mr. Zager simply takes a small piece of fine grit sand paper and folds it a few times making it thicker and runs it lightly down the side of the neck going over those protruding frets. This smooths them out so they’re no longer hurting your fingers.

This is very common as hydration will make the face of the guitar raise back into original position. At this point you can turn the truss key clockwise to lower action. Mr. Zager has a video on setting action on our help page at http://zager.com/help

Yes this can happen and is actually common on guitars with extremely dried woods. At the top of this page you’ll see the key indicator of a dried out guitar is cracks. What you didn’t realize is your guitars woods were already cracking inside, which is why its face dropped several millimeters giving you buzzing strings. Introducing water back into the woods causes the woods to expand back into original position and is now exposing what was already underneath, A CRACK. This is nothing to be alarmed about as cracks are common on acoustics https://www.texasmonthly.com/arts-entertainment/trigger/ and are easily repaired using a few drops of glue as Mr. Zager demonstrates on this page. The good thing is you just took a guitar that most shops would have considered non repairable and repaired it to within 1% of its original playability and sound, for free.

This is very common. If you refer to the top of this page you’ll see “loose braces” are one of the first signs of a dried out guitar. This happens because as the woods of the face and back dry, they sink which lowers the face and pushes in the bracing. At this point the braces are already loose. When you then put water back into the woods, it moves the face and back (and bracing) into their original position. This back and forth movement can cause a brace to loosen or fall out. This is nothing to be alarmed about as bracing can be reinstalled using a few drops of Elmers glue. On a positive note, you just repaired your guitar bringing it back to within 1% of its original playability without spending hundreds of dollars.

Here’s a secret many guitar shops don’t talk about. 99% of buzzing, playability and sound issues can be solved with water. When a guitar gets dry the face lowers 1-2 millimeters. This lowers the strings closer to the fret board causing buzzing, playability, sound issues and throws off the geometry of the entire instrument. To repair your guitar shops will recommend installing new frets, filing the frets, dressing the frets, building a new bridge, building a new saddle, building a new nut, replacing the entire neck. All these repairs can help alleviate issues caused by dryness, but you’ll spend hundreds, even thousands of dollars and your guitar may not be quite as good as it was new. Another option is you can hydrate your guitar which will put the body parts back into original position fixing all these issues naturally for free. Why don’t shops talk about this? BECAUSE THEY CAN’T CHARGE YOU FOR IT. We’d like to say these practices are rare, but being in the guitar business 100 years we’ve seen it’s actually the norm.

We keep our shop at 60-70% humidity depending on the season and recommend these numbers for all our models, especially our 80 and 900 Series guitars which have a higher-level bracing system. All guitars from all manufacturers must be stored in minimally 50% humidity at all times. On higher-level acoustics like our 80 and 900 series we recommend over 60%.  If not, the woods will warp causing playability and sound issues and will eventually crack. Damage can happen in a matter of weeks if conditions are dry enough.  New guitars with high-quality solid woods and low action are most susceptible.  Less expensive laminate (plastic) guitars with high action and poor sound will not be affected like a precision-made solid wood guitar with low action.  This type of damage is not warranted by any guitar manufacturer but it is repairable.

Most mold eventually dries, turns to dust and disappears, but it does take some time for this to happen. Also remember what we did here is take a guitar that most shops would call “non repairable” and brought it back to 100% playability and sound, for FREE. Sometimes there will be some remnants of watering but on the positive side you didn’t spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on a repair that would have only given you 50% of your sound and playability back. We’ve had many clients over the years who took their guitars to shops for these repairs and after spending $500 and not having their guitar for several months, they got back a guitar that did not play or sound nearly as good as it did originally.

During winter months when furnaces are running their hardest drying out the air even more, to keep humidity high it may require more than your guitar humidifier plugged into the sound hole. For those clients we recommend a simple $25 regular room humidifier. We also recommend this for clients in desert states when air is dryer year round.

When Mr. Zager repairs a dried guitar that’s been deemed “non repairable” by multiple shops, the first thing he does is hydrate it using the method in this video and nearly 100% of these guitars play perfectly again. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y2F-IX1JlnA The one thing he does differently though is he hydrates these guitars multiple times. If you have a guitar that’s been dry for months or YEARS it may need 3, 5 or even 7 rounds of water because it takes time building water content in a guitar that been dry for years where water content is near zero. This video talks about this in more detail. https://youtu.be/ExPNMfkLFqw
 
No guitar company warrants damage from dryness but Mr. Zager provides all the knowledge he’s gained in working with guitars over 80 years which allows most of our players to fix their own guitars free of charge. With that said if you’re the type that is not “hands on” most small shops and Guitar Center can repair these issues in a short amount of time for little investment, and without the $200 in back and forth shipping fees sending it to us. If you’d still like to send it to us please visit our service page at http://zager.com/service